The Australian Internet Blacklist – True or False?

The ‘top secret’ blacklist of banned websites, managed by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), was leaked out to the public through the infamous Whistleblower website, Wikileaks, whom now are in the blacklist. They claimed that the ACMA are banning innocent websites such as a local dentist and any links to these blacklisted websites, will be fined up to $11,000 a day. The question is, how would you know that you are linking to these banned site? and why are legal websites being blacklisted?

ACMA themselves are unable to give an explaination to why this is the case but have claimed that the publication of the Wikileak lists are unreliable and denied its the offical blacklist. They will be investigating closely with the Austrlian Federal Police.

In separate statements, the ACMA and Conroy, the communications minister, acknowledged that the official blacklist and the version published by Wikileaks contained sites common to both lists. But Conroy said several addresses on the published list have never appeared on the official blacklist.

The authority proposed that the lists only contain of websites that are promoting child pornography and sexual violence. However they refuse to release the ‘real’ list to the public.

Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy is now proposing that Australian internet service providers should implement this lists. Therefore Australia will then become one of the strictest Internet regulators among democratic countries. Internet Providers are protesting against this proposal and argues that:

“A filter could slow browsing speeds, and pointed out that illegal material such as child pornography can be traded on peer-to-peer networks or chats, which would not be covered by the filter.”